wouldn't have
had the heart to press them to go; and then what would he have done with
them? Their second and last line of defence, supposing they had
considered the Sacks had failed and were to be ruled out, was in
California, a place they spoke of as if it were next door to Boston and
New York. How could he have let them set out alone on that four days'
journey, with the possibility of once more at its end not being met? No
wonder he had been abstracted at tea. He was relieved to the extent of
his forehead going quite smooth again at their decision to proceed to
the Sacks. For he couldn't have taken them to his mother without
preparation and explanation, and he couldn't have left them in New York
while he went and prepared and explained. Great, reflected Mr. Twist,
the verb dropping into his mind with the _aplomb_ of an inspiration, are
the difficulties that beset a man directly he begins to twinkle. Already
he had earnestly wished to knock the reception clerk in the hotel office
down because of, first, his obvious suspicion of the party before he had
heard Mr. Twist's name, and because of, second, his politeness, his
confidential manner as of an understanding sympathizer with a rich man's
recreations, when he had. The tea, which he, had poured out of one of
his own teapots, had been completely spoilt by the knowledge that it was
only this teapot that had saved him from being treated as a White Slave
Trafficker. He wouldn't have got into that hotel at all with the
Twinklers, or into any other decent one, except for his teapot. What a
country, Mr. Twist had thought, fresh from his work in France, fresh
from where people were profoundly occupied with the great business of
surviving at all. Here he came back from a place where civilization
toppled, where deadly misery, deadly bravery, heroism that couldn't be
uttered, staggered month after month among ruins, and found America
untouched, comfortable, fat, still with time to worry over the suspected
amorousness of the rich, still putting people into uniforms in order to
buttonhole a man on landing and cross-question him as to his private
purities.

He had been much annoyed, but he too couldn't resist the extreme
pleasure of real exercise on such a lovely evening, nor could he resist
the infection of the cheerfulness of the Twinklers. They walked along,
talking and laughing, and seeming to walk much faster than he did,
especially Anna-Rose who had to break into a run every